Water Industry (Schemes for Adoption of Private Sewers) Regulations 2011

My Lords, I welcome the opportunity to introduce these draft regulations to your Lordships. Their purpose is to effect the transfer of private sewers and lateral drains to the statutory water and sewerage companies. Under similar arrangements, sewers constructed prior to October 1937 were, under the Public Health Act 1936, automatically adopted as public sewers and are maintained by the water and sewerage companies. However, since then adoption has been undertaken on a voluntary basis. While it was the likely intention of the 1936 Act and subsequent legislation that sewers should be adopted, for various reasons that has not happened on a universal basis. Even where adoption agreements were reached and new sewers constructed to the requisite standards, the adoption process was not always followed through. The result is a legacy of unadopted private sewers and drains that has accumulated since 1937. Very often, the owners of these assets—typically householders—are unaware of their responsibilities and liabilities. The repair and maintenance of private sewers can be very expensive for individual householders. Where drainage arrangements are shared, it can be difficult to recover costs from those who use the sewers but are unaffected by any problems. Private sewers may run beneath a neighbour’s land or a highway, such that access is both difficult and costly. While many private sewers function satisfactorily, the disparate ownership of these assets, which are essential to everyday life and important to public health, means that they are not always maintained in an economic and integrated way to a consistent, high standard. Many of us are aware of examples of persistent sewerage problems that require attention. In addition, there is the inequity that private sewer owners pay not only for the maintenance of their sewers but also, through their sewerage charges, for the upkeep of pre-1937 sewers, which are maintained by the water and sewerage companies. The transfer proposed in the regulations will place the owners of post-1937 private sewers on a similar footing to those with pre-1937 sewers. Successive consultations have concluded that an overnight transfer to the water and sewerage companies is the preferred approach. Not all sewers will be transferred. Those which carry only surface water and do not discharge to a public sewer will not be transferred. The same will apply to sewerage systems that serve a single, centrally managed site or cartilage, as for example might be the case with a shopping mall or industrial estate. Systems that drain to private treatment facilities or to septic tanks and the like are also excluded. Action is necessary to redress the failures of the 1936 Act. The objective is to ensure better maintenance of what are currently private sewers, resulting in less environmental pollution, the minimising of threats to public health, fewer complaints from householders and businesses about what is perceived to be a costly and unfair burden, and fewer disputes requiring local authority intervention. In the longer term, an integrated approach will achieve a better managed sewerage system that will have lower maintenance costs and will be more resilient and effective. The water and sewerage companies which already have a sewer maintenance capability are well placed to take this on. The impact assessment estimates that additional costs will add to water bills an average of £5 per annum from 2011, rising to £8 per annum by 2019, with a range from £3 to £14 across the companies. While increases in charges can never be welcome, at up to a little over £1 a month, these relatively modest annual increases are to be preferred to a system in which costs fall unequally across water charge payers or unfairly on individuals. Overall, they represent a sound investment in the future maintenance of essential assets. The transfer exercise does not itself trigger major expenditure on those parts of the system that are currently working satisfactorily; it will be for the water and sewerage companies to assess and prioritise what is essential short-term maintenance, repair or replacement. The draft regulations provide, at Regulation 3, for the Secretary of State and Welsh Ministers to make schemes for the transfer of private sewers and private lateral drains to the statutory water and sewerage undertakers. Sewers are defined as all drains that are shared. Lateral drains are those which serve a single property but lie outside the boundary of that property. Pumping stations which form part of the system will also be transferred. In order to qualify for transfer, private sewers and lateral drains must be connected to the public system on 1 July 2011. The transfer itself will take place on 1 October 2011, with the exception of pumping stations, which may be transferred individually or in groups at any time before 1 October 2016. As I have said, sewers and related equipment that carry surface water only and do not discharge to a public sewer will not be transferred. Sewers constructed after 1 October will be the subject of separate proposals for mandatory adoption arrangements that are not under consideration today, but which should be the subject of consultation shortly. Regulation 4 makes provision for the Secretary of State and Welsh Ministers to make supplementary schemes for transfer. Private sewers and lateral drains which are connected to a public sewer between 1 July and the commencement of Section 42 of the Floods and Water Management Act 2010, currently planned for 1 October 2011, will neither qualify for transfer on 1 July nor be subject to new-build arrangements for adoption which will be effective upon commencement of Section 42. Unfortunately, it was not possible to synchronise the dates: therefore it is necessary to introduce a supplementary transfer scheme to cater for sewers connected between these dates. Supplementary transfer is planned for 1 April 2012. Regulation 5 makes provision for certain exemptions, including for railway land which would present operational difficulties for water and sewerage companies, and for Crown land, where the arrangement is for sewers to be transferred unless relevant land is ““opted out”” of transfer. Regulation 6 makes provision for sewerage undertakers to make a declaration to vest private sewers by publishing notice in the London Gazette and the local press, and by sending individual notices to the owners of private sewers. Regulation 7 provides that where there are existing declarations, the provisions of the regulations shall not apply. Regulations 8 and 9 provide that outstanding appeals will be discontinued and that Section 104 adoption agreements that have been executed will cease. Where a sewer remains to be built or connected, a Section 104 agreement will remain valid. Existing legislation provides for a right of appeal to Ofwat against transfer of assets for both the owners of private sewers and third parties through whose land a drain may pass or who may be disadvantaged by the transfer. Finally, the regulations are relatively short-lived in that they are subject to a sunset clause effective in 2016. They provide for a once-and-for-all transfer of private sewers, lateral drains and associated private pumping stations. Once the transfer is complete, by 2016 for pumping stations, the regulations will serve no further purpose and will be repealed automatically. I hope that noble Lords will accept them.